eg staff including Elizabeth Gooch, eg’s CEO, visited the Doornkop Needy Children’s Centre last week and purchased items from a ‘wish list’ of educational items using some of the funds raised over the last few months.  Items included baby play toys, puzzles and building blocks for the crèche.

Elizabeth Gooch said “It is so important that we continue our regular fundraising activities for the Centre to expand the facilities they have available and contribute towards the children’s education.  It is clear that their health has improved with the regular food supplied through our sponsorship.  But the real difference we can make will come from educating these children so they can change their own lives when they are older”.

The Doornkop Needy Children Centre provides shelter, clothing, education and love to orphans and destitute children from the age of 0–5 years.  Currently around 160 children are in their care.  eg decided to support Doornkop after being introduced to their work by the CEO of weekly South African newsletter ‘South Africa – The Good News’ and has since pledged to support the charity in their short and long term objectives.

If you would like to find out more about the Doornkop Needy Children’s Centre, click here or email ask@eguk.co.uk.

The Doornkop Needy Children Centre provides shelter, clothing, education and love to orphans and destitute children from the age of 0–5 years.  Currently around 160 children are in their care.  eg decided to support Doornkop after being introduced to their work by the CEO of weekly South African newsletter ‘South Africa – The Good News’ and has since pledged to support the charity in their short and long term objectives.

Each year operational management software applications vendor eg and other supporters of Doornkop host a Christmas party for the children and chose to organise something different from the usual format this year.  For many of the children the trip to the zoo was the first time they had left their hometown of Soweto and seen live animals.

Following a tour around the zoo, the children enjoyed burgers from the braai (or barbeque) provided by ‘South Africa – The Good News’.  The day ended with a performance from the children of ‘We wish you a Merry Christmas’ followed by a traditional African Dance.

Read more about the Doornkop Christmas party in the ‘South Africa – The Good News’ newsletter.

Wendy Jeavons, Managing Director of eg South Africa, said:  “The children thoroughly enjoyed themselves and it was a fantastic experience for eg staff to see the direct impact of our recent fundraising.  The caregivers felt that it was a great change to previous Christmas parties because it was fun and educational at the same time.”

The funds for the party were raised following fundraising activities with clients and staff.  eg would like to thank everyone who has supported Doornkop over the last year.

Photographs from the event can be viewed here.  If you would like to find out more about the Doornkop Needy Children’s Centre, click here or email ask@eguk.co.uk.

The contract includes a five year licence for the eg operational intelligence® software suite as well as implementation and training services to achieve improved management practices.

Elizabeth Gooch, Chief Executive Officer, commented: “This new customer win in the healthcare division of one of South Africa’s leading financial services companies is the second healthcare customer we now have in this territory and further builds on the success we have already achieved this year in this market.”

About eg solutions plc

eg solutions plc is an operations management software applications vendor.  Our software provides real-time, historic and predictive Operational MI.  When implemented with our training programme for managers and team leaders to use this intelligence, we guarantee improvements in operational results in short timescales.

The Company, which is listed on the Alternative Investment Market (‘AIM’) of the London Stock Exchange, is committed to customer satisfaction and the ongoing development of its operations management solutions.

BPM is becoming increasingly popular, having evolved from simply a technique for solving tactical problems on a departmental level, to providing a comprehensive platform that supports the whole business. This evolution is being fuelled by the pressing need for businesses to cope with a range of different and often complex processes, as well as the requirement for high availability and scalability.

Tony Cohn, Business Development Director at eg South Africa, will speak to attendees on the subject of: ‘Combining BI (or rather OI) and performance management with BPM – too much BP and not enough M’. This will include the following topics:

• Operational intelligence vs. business intelligence – what’s the difference?
• Examining how to enable true real-time BPM at individual, team, department and process levels simultaneously
• Assessing the role of management methodology in providing continuous improvement in service delivery and productivity
• Defining a truly balanced set of real-time operational intelligence metrics
• Determining whether it is possible to have balanced score cards in real-time from the strategic to the task level with automated consolidation across individual, team, department, division and geographic location.

The comprehensive two day conference programme features 24 leading BPM professionals including 12 case studies from ABSA, Telkom, Eskom, Old Mutual, SAPO, Mutual & Federal, Nedbank, Santam, ABSA Life, Medihelp, L@W and PBMR. In addition, delegates have the opportunity to attend one of two post-conference workshops on Process at the Core of Business Strategy and Designing a Process Architecture and Frameworks.

eg’s software is used to augment existing IT platforms – including BPM, BI, Workforce Management, CRM and core processing systems – to provide the missing link – historic, real-time and predictive operational intelligence. eg’s solutions have been implemented across a range of global businesses, principally in blue-chip financial services companies but also in other service sectors including legal services and retail. They have been used across a wide variety of process driven functions – Back Offices, Contact Centres, Finance, Compliance, HR and Sales.

For more information, click here.

These Managers and Team Leaders were the first of eg’s clients to complete the programme since the Banking Sector Education and Training Authority (BANKSETA) – the leading awarding body for training and national qualifications in the banking industry in South Africa – endorsed eg as a training provider for the South African market.

Resolution is a South African based complete financial services provider which offers a range of quality, affordable health, life and short-term insurance offerings. Between February and June 2009 the organisation implemented the eg principles of operational management® to achieve consistent management practices and improved team leader capability alongside the eg operational intelligence® software suite as the work, resource, performance management and reporting solution.

Wendy Jeavons, Managing Director of eg South Africa who presented certificates to Resolution following the completion of the principles training, said: “Resolution’s Team Leaders really embraced the principles. They have developed their skills in how to operationally manage their people, processes and work and the benefits delivered are a demonstration of their hard work and commitment.”

BANKSETA supports transformation and people development through partnerships to enable stakeholders to advance the national and global position of the broader banking and microfinance industry. All Managers and Team Leaders who successfully complete eg’s operational management training programme are thereby provided with the recognition from a leading professional awarding body.

In this photo: The Resolution team which completed eg’s operational management training and representatives from eg .

Over the last few years eg has nominated many of its clients to win prestigious Financial Innovation Awards – last year the Awards ceremony was attended by several shortlisted clients, including The Co-operative Financial Services and Capita, and in 2007 Legal & General General Insurance were the winners in the Most Innovative Customer Service Programme category.

This year eg has submitted several nominations for Legal & General With Profits, Resolution (South Africa) and for the eg operational intelligence® software suite in the Technology Vendors – Most Innovative Financial Services Solution category.

The shortlist for the 2009 Awards will be announced in August – we wish all of our nominated clients the best of luck!

The programme creates a common understanding of best practice across Team Members, Team Leaders and Senior Leaders. However, our philosophy and approach makes sure that the learning gained is put into practice and that the required activities and behaviours are pulled through an organisation to deliver real impact.

The core of the programme is the eg process for managing®, where Managers and Team Leaders are coached in using management techniques to enable them to make the right operational decisions and achieve tangible, realised benefits.

To get your copy of the South Africa training brochure, email (South Africa) ask@egsa.co.za or(UK) ask@eguk.co.uk.

eg organises regular fundraising activities for the Centre, the last of which saw three senior members of the Software team swop their suits for pink tutus in return for sponsorship money – if you haven’t seen the photographs click here. The ‘eg fairies’ raised over £1000.

The delivery to the Centre was greeted with immense excitement, even though most of the items were practical gifts for the Centre rather than items for the children themselves. Gifts included:

• Buckets
• Bowls
• Jugs
• Plastic cups
• Face cloths
• Flip chart paper
• First aid kits
• Wall charts
• Stacking fun sets
• Hoola hoops
• Disney character balls
• A black board
• White chalk
• Beacon fizz pops

Thank you to everyone who has helped eg support The Doornkop Needy Children’s Centre over the last year. If you would like more information about the work the Centre undertakes, or would like to make a donation, email ask@eguk.co.uk.

The spectacle was in aid of eg’s company charity, The Doornkop Needy Children’s Centre in South Africa, chosen after eg opened a subsidiary company in the country in 2007. The aim of the Centre is to provide 160 poor children between the age of 1 to 5 years old with safety, shelter, clothing, education and love. Some of the children have been abandoned or orphaned and live in foster care, and some are HIV positive. They all come from very poor families.

eg’s donations to the centre have helped provide:

• e-pap (a nutritious cereal which swells when added to milk or water to provide a healthy meal)
• Toys
• Learning materials
• Clothes
• A Christmas party

As little as £40 can provide food for one child for a year and around £125 can provide one child’s food, clothing and school fees for a year.

Phil Ezzard, one of eg’s fairies, said: “To begin with this started off as a joke with clients but it soon became clear that they were genuinely keen to humiliate us and it was therefore a great opportunity to have a bit of fun but raise some serious money at the same time! At the moment it looks like we have hit our £1,000 target, an amount that will go a long way in supporting The Doornkop Needy Children’s Centre to continue to make children’s wishes come true.”

If you would like read more about eg’s work with The Doornkop Needy Children’s centre, visit the South Africa pages of the eg website: http://www.eguk.co.uk/eg-south-africa/. To find out more about the centre, including how you can sponsor a child, visit: www.dncc.co.za/.

To see photographs of the eg faires, click here.

The Banking Sector Training and Education Authority (BANKSETA), highly respected in the banking sector in South Africa, endorsed eg as a training provider for the South African market. eg delivers an operational management training programme which includes courses in eg’s proprietary eg operational intelligence® software suite and the eg principles of operational management® methodology. Managers and Team Leaders who train with eg will now receive an endorsement from BANKSETA.

A representative from BANKSETA moderated eg’s training delivery by reviewing an active project taking place at Resolution Health, a prominent provider of health insurance services, based in Bocksbruim. eg was assessed on its ability to deliver training and support learners and was required to provide evidence around various criteria, including ‘provision of training to learners’ and ‘quality control’.

eg provides full skills transfer during its projects with clients – not only training Managers and Team Leaders to use its software and methodology to improve operational performance, but also providing coaching during and post implementation. Clients are taught fact-based management of work, people and performance to deliver significantly improved results.

Karen Hobbs, Manager: Education & Training Quality Assurance for the BANKSETA said: “I’m very pleased that eg has been awarded accreditation with the BANKSETA, they’ve worked very hard to gain this status, drawing on both their local and international policies and procedures. They exemplify what we would like our training providers to be aiming for – the global standard of training and skills development for South Africa.”

Wendy Jeavons, Managing Director, explained: “We are extremely pleased that BANKSETA have recognised eg as a trainer for South Africa. This demonstrates our ability and credibility as an operations management training provider and is an endorsement of our strengths.”

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